Published: Thursday, February 01, 2007
Global warming is heating up into a major issue in British Columbia politics with a warning Thursday from a broad coalition of labour, environmental, aboriginal and religious leaders that Premier Gordon Campbell must set tough standards on green-house gas emissions.
In a public letter on the eve of today's release of a United Nation's International Panel on Climate Change, which concludes humans are "very likely" contributing to global warming, the B.C. group is demanding Premier Campbell take local action to reverse the province's upward trend in greenhouse gas emissions believed to accelerate climate change.
The coalition's letter -- which was distributed by Vancouver environmentalist David Suzuki's foundation -- warns "there can be no doubt that bold and immediate leadership is required of governments around the world to combat global warming."
The leaders -- who include B.C. Federation of Labour president Jim Sinclair and Grand Chief Stewart Philip, president of the Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs -- say British Columbians have already gotten a taste of global warming's potential havoc with the recent wild winter weather as well as the relentless march of the mountain pine beetle, the tiny insects that are destroying much of the province's pine forests thanks to warmer winters.
